Paul Newman

Turner Classic Movies is paying tribute to the late Paul Newman by setting aside its entire schedule on Oct. 12 for films starring the superstar actor.

The 24-Hour marathon will feature, among other movies, “Cool Hand Luke,” “Somebody Up There Likes Me,” “Torn Curtain,” “Exodus” and “Hud.” Alas, no “Butch Cassidy” or “The Sting.” Some other channel must have the rights to those.

I was shocked to get up this morning and read about Paul Newman’s death. Over at the ol’ paper, there’s a belief that these things come in threes. A couple of days ago we had David Foster Wallace, and now, we have Newman. You have to wonder who’s going to die next. … I hope it’s not some big leader with a beard who lives on a certain island. That would be a headache to get into the Sunday paper.

On the brighter side of life, the holiday video game season is picking up. I have a ton of titles to cover and a bonanza of events to attend. Well, at least, I can say it’s never dull around here.

And now, the highlights of the week:

1. The PlayStation 3 and the Xbox 360′s software is coming along. On the PS3 side, more games are getting trophies. In the past week, Burnout Paradise and wipEout HDwere added to the list.

On the Xbox 360 side, Microsoft will be shutting down Xbox Live on Monday *gasp* in preparation of the New Xbox Experience. It’s not coming immediately after but the shutdown paves the way for it.

2. On the review side, we had three guest reviews. The first was from Gamester newbie E. Glenn Malinis who took a look at Warhammer: Battle March, a real time strategy game. It tries to bring the RTS experience to the console, but like many other games, it doesn’t quite stack up to the PC experience.

Our resident Otaku Jerome Cartagena played through Tales of Vesperia and loved the role playing game despite the conventional characters, gameplay, etc.

3. The multimedia extravaganza video of the week has to be this awesome, awesome ad for Wario Land: Shake It. The guy or gal who thought this up should get a raise. After seeing it, I’m sure you’ll agree.

4. With worldwide economic collapse looming, it’s imperative that players get registered to vote. We posted an item that a colleague of ours found on Edge about how the presidential candidates and running mates stack up.

There really is no definite gamer candidate, but there are varying degrees of gamerness to them. (The word “gamerness” being a distant cousin to the word “truthiness.”) There are also peripheral issues that relate to gaming that players should consider. For example, look at the candidates’ stances on net neutrality.

And once you find out which candidate is for you, go to the Video Game Voters Network to sign up. You can also get into the election game by registering on your Xbox Live. Now that it’s so easy, you really should do it.